Sandwiches
by katryne
Summary: A possible Pretender recollects


**Sandwiches**   
**by katryne**

Don't mind me, just posting up old fics here. Feedback much appreciated however. 

Disclaimer: *sing-song* I don't own them... 

Summary: A possible Pretender recollects. Somewhat Season 2-ish. 

* * *

Agnes has probably spent most of her life being strange. 

So it was quite a delight to find someone as strange, or even stranger than her. 

His name was Jarod. Agnes was sure that everyone has a last name, but not Jarod. Not yet anyway. But Jarod-without-a-last-name was gone. He came, and he left. Like the proverbial breeze. Although not exactly a breeze, more like a thing picked up by the breeze and let down at whim. 

Oh well, Agnes was never one for accuracy. As long as it's right. 

Not that she ever questions just how was it that she knew the right from the wrong. Perhaps it's a gift. Or a curse. She could never decide. Because she can't. 

So now there she was, standing in front of the abandoned warehouse that became Jarod's home for a few weeks. It wasn't much of a home, more like a dwelling. It wasn't… homey enough. There was no heart in it. Home is where the heart is, she recollects. And Jarod's heart wasn't there. It was just a place for Jarod to sleep, to plan, to prepare, to hide. Just like all the other places he has stayed before. 

Not that she knew, but it was right. She never asked, he never told, but she knew all the same. About his quest. His search. The mission to find his memories and his heart. Maybe he suspected, maybe not, but Agnes doesn't care about that. Her life was of no importance. 

But apparently Jarod's was. 

Like a mishandled parade that never got its rhythm together, with Jarod as its bandleader long gone, comes a troop of people anxious for clues to tell them just where he might be next. Not just anxious, but also very vexed. At least that's what she could tell, judging from the mess they have cause, in upending everything to find a scrap of… something to lead them to him. 

At least that's what she could tell in solid words. There's more to this than just 'anxious' and 'vexed'. There was frustration, elation, fear, hope, anger, happiness, timidity, brazenness, all coming from so many people (and more often than not, two opposite feelings would come from the same sources), swirling together in this concrete space, thickening the air so much, Agnes could feel that she has only to pluck a feeling and it would be hers. 

She walked into the building without a trace of fear in her features. She should be afraid perhaps, but it was where her friend stayed, even for a little while. She can visit it, no one can stop her. And it was this absence of the very thing people pounce upon to cause intimidation that made her progress relatively smooth. People pointedly ignored her. She didn't mind to the non-attention, it was something normal to her. Although this was the sort of ignorance she never encountered before. It had a different basis. Not caused by There's Something Unpleasant, Let's Turn Our Heads and Pretend It Doesn't Exist, but based by There's Something Unpleasant, Let's Wait till the Superior Shows Up. And Sit Back And Enjoy The Fireworks. 

Who doesn't enjoy a good explosion? Agnes certainly does. But this Hour of Reckoning has to wait. Agnes was hungry. Not afraid, but hungry, certainly. 

She sat down on an upside-down wooden crate. In all the frenzy to cause havoc to everything, something that should have been Torn To Splinters On Its Way To The Wall became her seat. She dusted it a bit, but she was wearing her black jeans, so she didn't worry about the dirt quite so much. She put her lunchbox on her lap, almost primly, as if this was a five-star restaurant, instead of a dilapidated warehouse. Granny might not be able to afford her much education, but Granny managed to teach one thing very clearly: manners. It was the only sort of polish she ever had, short of shoeshine. 

She opened the lunchbox and took out her favourite food: mayo-and-corn-syrup sandwich. Other kids took it as another sign of her weirdness and come recess would tease her about how 'vile' it is, but Jarod liked it a lot. And anyone who can love mayo-and-corn-syrup sandwiches as much as her can't be all that bad in her books. 

Not that she had much of those. Books, that is. Granny couldn't afford it. Granny (and by extension, herself) couldn't afford many things. No special school for her, just your average, government-funded public schools. Nothing wrong with them, if you're normal, but Agnes wasn't. She didn't mind the bullying (she has better things to do, than to develop emotional trauma and hang-ups; she was too sanguine for someone at the age where every nerve should be high-strung), but she minded the lack of challenge very much. Oh, at first, she was promoted ahead of her intended grade(s), going through class after advanced class, but after the third promotion, the teachers collectively reached a mental blockade. There was no way, they reasoned, for a child like this to have an IQ like that. And so she stopped going to school altogether (except for the occasional visits to the library; the librarian was kind, and let her borrow books without a student card). At least that saved on school fees. 

Granny never stopped her, for the same reason the teachers did. They just didn't understand. Couldn't. Wouldn't. It's just not in them. They couldn't see that somehow Agnes was special. Oh, they could certainly see that she was different, but they never figured how different. They say she has an active imagination. That's not true. She has no use for imagination, when she can just be anything she wants to. The boys in the neighbourhood sometimes imagine they're pirates, or astronauts, and tied bedsheets to broomsticks so they could sail. Agnes doesn't need that, not when she can actually feel the lull of the sea or the smell of the salty air. But she rarely went for the fantastic adventures. Being the grocer's wife is more than exciting at times. Just yesterday, she saw Mrs. Alice walked down the street with a merry air, and Agnes knew that meant the tax rebate came through. Why risk pretending seasickness when there's extra cash in the mail? Agnes would probably buy more bread, but Mrs. Alice would persuade her husband to install some new awnings. 

So it was during one of her excursions that she found Jarod, deep in thought. He was leaning against the sliding door of the warehouse, reading a red notebook, well not so much reading than committing the contents of it to heart. Funny that she used that phrase. Jarod's searching for his heart, his home, but he doesn't realise he's carrying it with him all along. 

That's what happens when you don't know. What you don't know, can't hurt you. Ignorance is bliss. Bull—(she never had the courage to finish the word. Very impolite). What you don't know, hurts you badly. Blessed is ignorance when it's not known. But after a person becomes aware of the gap, questions and doubts zoom in, trying to fill it up as a poor substitute to truth. Nature, after all, abhors a vacuum. 

Jarod and her became fast friends, united in their common love for sweets. She never questioned the coincidence that her friend was working as a computer programmer, in the wake of a scandal involving a software engineer who was charged with murder, despite his empathic claims of innocence. And how he left just as it turns out the engineer was innocent after all. If more people think like Agnes, words like 'paranoia' and 'conspiracy' would probably never exist. And mayo-and-corn-syrup sandwich would be a standard fixture in eating establishments everywhere. 

What she did question was how come she never got into the spirit of experimenting until after Jarod's arrival. They tried all sorts of combinations: maple syrup, raspberry, chocolate, strawberry, Twinkie frosting instead of mayo (that one gave the both of them a fifteen minute headache. As tolerant as they were, it was still too much of a sugar shock). But they still stuck to classic corn syrup. Mainly because Jarod bought boxes of the stuff, and there was plenty left over after the bulk of them was used to catch the man responsible for the murder. Not that he told her, but she knew. Not precisely, but just enough. She made the mistake of being Jarod once, right after their first meeting. They were too much alike for it to work, so she settled for just peering into things at the top of his mind. That was less tiring, and certainly will not cause her to near faint. 

She remembered the day clearly, because first failures tend to be particularly vivid in memory. She could not understand why something that was so effortless to her before was so dangerous this time. This was one of the only things she was good at. She can't do many things right, but this wasn't one of them. She would slip in and out personalities at will, usually out of boredom, never forced. But she would 'be' someone if they were new to her, primarily as a way to protect herself. It's her own way of determining friend or foe, for she doesn't seem capable to do it like normal people do. Or at least at the same rate. This way was hers alone. Let the world go on, she can cope. 

But not with him. That was when he first suspected. She knew Jarod always knew there was something beyond her disability, but it was too hidden in plain view to be useful to anyone but to herself. It was like a blind man who compensates in having acute hearing. Certainly others would benefit, but not quite as much as the blind man himself. But Jarod helped her a little. Helped her refine and focus it. As much as he could in such short space of busy time. But Agnes always fancied herself a quick learner. 

She was at her second sandwich when the atmosphere changed. The bustle of the endlessly hardworking men didn't stop, but their emotions stopped swirling. The cauldron was quivering and waiting. For her actions and reactions. Not Agnes'. But her. The dark-haired woman with the stern expression to hide her kind face, and the older sad-eyed man with a small smile to hide it. All the lying and hiding. Deceit and subterfuge. No wonder Jarod left. Keeping secrets can be tiring. 

She was beginning to be the woman when her stomach turned and became queasy. So she was one too. Well, it has certainly been a period for discoveries. She stopped and began on the man. Much better. She should have started on him. All her answers he possessed. So he's close to Jarod. Not as close as her, but sometimes closer. Like a father. Like a friend. Not really like her, who shares a more intimate bond somehow, but all Agnes had was his suspicions. They're hunting him, but they won't hurt him. Yet they bring an overwhelming threat to her friend. Was all Jarod's acquaintance this complex? If she tried to sort it out, she'd only be confused. But Agnes never look for the reason, when on some instinctual level, she understood these people perfectly (Or as perfect as she could get when one half of them were like smoke to her; intangible like Jarod). They were still complicated, but at least she wasn't confused. 

"Who is the girl?" 

The abrupt question startled her out her reverie. The woman wasn't even waiting for an answer as she lights a cigarette. 

"I'm Jarod's friend," came the slurred answer. 

"Trust Jarod to befriend a retard." The tone was cold and unfeeling, but there was sympathy from where it came from. Nobody had heard the echo, not even the old man. 

"Miss Parker…" he cautioned. 

"Fine, you go ask her Syd. I've enough of freaks and geeks." She exhaled a stream of smoke from her nostrils. Agnes watched in fascination, she never saw someone smoking up close. This Miss Parker realised her attention, and fixed her a cold stare. After a while, she blinked and looked away. It was probably the first time she has been out-stared. If anyone had noticed, they were discreet enough to never mention it. 

The man called Syd crouched. "Do you know where Jarod is?" he asked softly. 

It took Agnes a second to fully comprehend the question and answer it. She was still processing what she had learned from Miss Parker's eyes. "He left." 

"Did you tell you where?" 

"He never told any of his friends before, why should I be any different?" 

This time she caught them both by surprise. They didn't expect such insight. 

"Did he tell you that?" the man asked carefully. It wasn't just the answer that surprised them, but how it was said. Her bearing gave them pause. 

"He doesn't need to, I knew," Agnes admitted earnestly. 

This time, Syd stood up and walked to Miss Parker, who somehow seemed to be smoking the cigarette at a faster rate. Agnes was sorry that she somehow placed Miss Parker in a position where she must decide a person's future (and this time, Agnes was almost certain, not at the point of a gun). They were talking furiously. Syd was half-hearted in pursuing his argument; Miss Parker was unnecessarily brusque in hers. Words like 'Pretender', 'potential', 'retard' flew from them. She was glad for the conversation, she was beginning to understand Miss Parker better. 

So here she was, Jarod's answer. And both of them unaware of this. Maybe the reason why Jarod never realised his heart was there was because it was missing a piece. Was it a sentimental answer? Agnes couldn't say, but it was definitely true. Miss Parker holds the key. 

"The Centre does not deal in the disabled!" came the angry final word. 

Syd acquiesced and fell silent. Agnes saw the cigarette was nearing its stump. Miss Parker did not see what Syd saw. She refused to see it. In her own harsh way, it was her means of saving Agnes from this terror they know as The Centre. She refused to see a gifted individual, but rather a person with her lunch smeared about the mouth. What Jarod gave in lessons, she gave in wilful blindness. 

Where was her manners? Granny would be displeased if she found out. 

"Thank you," Agnes said simply, and the three knew just what exactly what this girl was thanking for. No one else was near; the men had made their escape a long while ago. They've learnt the importance of giving Miss Parker a wide berth. Something flickered behind the woman's eyes, and all she did was put out her cigarette. 

Agnes took Miss Parker's hand and gave her sandwich to the woman. "Here. I haven't eaten it yet. Jarod liked it. Maybe you too." 

And she left, leaving Miss Parker speechless by her audacity and thoughtfulness, strange though it is. 

Agnes walked away from the warehouse, as fearless as when she first entered it. The lunchbox was swinging idly from her right hand. Maybe she ought to go to the ice-cream stand. Who knows, Billy might make her an ice-cream sandwich. 

END 


End file.
